On September 23, HHS announced that it will begin working on the initiative with the Institute of Medicine (IOM) to begin work to develop “clinical diagnostic criteria” for ME/CFS. That announcement can be found here http://bit.ly/18m7XlJ

The same day, 35 of the leading researchers and clinicians in the field of Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (ME/CFS) sent an open letter to Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius announcing they have reached a consensus on adopting the Canadian Consensus Criteria (CCC) as the research and clinical case definition for ME/CFS. They called for HHS to follow their lead by using the CCC as the sole case definition for ME/CFS in all of HHS’s activities related to the disease and strongly urged HHS to abandon its plans to reach out to groups like the Institute of Medicine to develop clinical diagnostic criteria.

The Sept 23, 2013 open letter from ME/CFS researchers and clinicians to Secretary Sebelius can be found here - http://bit.ly/15npS9B

Our ME/CFS experts have spoken. We need to support them and call on HHS to follow their lead. Adopt the CCC. Cancel the IOM contract as wasteful, unnecessary and harmful.

For U.S. residents: Please contact your congressional leaders and the President’s science advisor today and ask them to tell HHS to adopt the CCC and cancel the IOM contract. Please ask your family and network to do the same.

Instructions and a sample letter are below. Additional background can be found here http://bit.ly/16qOLY3

==========================================================================Instructions to Email or Call Your Congressional Leader (U.S. only)1.Senators and members of the House of Representatives need to hear directly from their constituents. You can get the contact information for your congressional leaders at this website:http://www.congressmerge.com/onlinedb/index.htmType your zip code into the form and click on “Submit It”. The website will return the names of your two senators and one representative along with their phone numbers and a link to their contact form. 2.If you are calling, ask to speak to the legislative aide that deals with healthcare issues. You can use the sample letter as talking points.3.If you are sending an email, click on the link to the web contact form for your senators and representative. This will bring up the web contact form for that legislative leader. a.If you are using the sample letter, copy it into the box provided for your message. b.Use “Stop the IOM Contract to Redefine ME/CFS" as the subject. c.If the online form indicates that you need to choose the nature of the issue, select a choice dealing with healthcare.

I am asking you to contact the Department of Health & Human Service (HHS) today and tell them to follow the lead of Myalgic Encephalomyeltis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (ME/CFS) disease experts. Tell HHS to adopt the Canadian Consensus Criteria and cancel its contract with the Institute of Medicine (IOM) to redefine ME/CFS. On September 23, HHS announced that it has contracted with the IOM to develop clinical diagnostic criteria for ME/CFS, rejecting the use of criteria created by ME/CFS experts, including the 2003 Canadian Consensus Criteria (CCC). HHS pursued the contract unilaterally with virtually no if any involvement of ME/CFS experts or patients. Further, HHS has stated that it intends to use people with no expertise in ME/CFS to redefine ME/CFS. Adding to the concerns, the IOM’s only other effort to define a disease has been harshly criticized by Gulf War Illness (GWI) advocates for using non-experts, emphasizing psychiatric issues over evidence of chemical injuries and moving it toward a broadly defined symptom-based syndrome. For all these reasons, ME/CFS patients have been protesting the IOM contract for weeks but HHS went ahead with the contract anyway.

Its important to note that on the same day that HHS announced that IOM would begin work, thirty-five of the leading ME/CFS researchers and clinicians wrote to Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius calling for the Canadian Consensus Criteria (CCC) to be used as the sole case definition for ME/CFS. The ME/CFS experts also urged HHS to abandon its plans to contract with the Institute of Medicine to create its own definition.

This is an unprecedented statement by our top experts and indicates researchers and clinicians are able and willing to the use the CCC now and improve on it as science develops. As the letter states, "Since the expert ME/CFS scientific and medical community has developed and adopted a case definition for research and clinical purposes, this effort (the IOM study) is unnecessary and would waste scarce taxpayer funds that would be much better directed toward funding research on this disease. Worse, this effort threatens to move ME/CFS science backward by engaging non-experts in the development of a case definition for a complex disease about which they are not knowledgeable."

I have been personaly affected by ME/CFS. It is a debilitating disease that causes neurological and immunological dysfunction and leaves patients bedridden, housebound and unable to work. ME/CFS costs the U.S. economy an estimated $17-23 billion dollars a year in lost productivity and direct medical costs. Due to the overly broad 'case definition' (criteria) used for this disease by HHS since 1994, patients with ME/CFS are lumped together with patients with depression, deconditioning and unspecified chronic fatigue. The use of these overly broad criteria has impeded ME/CFS research and severely impaired medical care for patients like me.

Given the overwhelming opposition to HHS' plans by both patients and experts, I am asking you to contact HHS today and tell them to follow the lead of ME/CFS disease experts. Tell HHS to adopt the Canadian Consensus Criteria. Tell HHS to cancel the contract with IOM.

OK my emails are sent out. I hope everyone keeps emailing this letter. I feel like a sack of concrete and just the simple task of emailing these letters was a task. But it's something I can do to help from home and it's worth the effort it takes me.

"Senators and Representatives are responding to our messages. However, they don't know who to turn to for guidance. Therefore, please include the sentence "If you have questions, please contact MEACTNOW@yahoo.com". And add the links to the background information ( http://bit.ly/16qOLY3as well as the FAQ (http://bit.ly/1eHuMGO to your messages. If you're phoning, use the latter two documents to field questions from Legislative Assistants. Thank you, all!"